Qualys, Inc. (QLYS) has reported a 358.50 percent jump in profit for the quarter ended Mar. 31, 2017. The company has earned $21.93 million, or $0.56 a share in the quarter, compared with $4.78 million, or $0.13 a share for the same period last year. On an adjusted basis, net profit for the quarter was almost stable at $7.96 million, or $0.20 a share, when compared with the last year period.

Revenue during the quarter grew 14.86 percent to $53.12 million from $46.25 million in the previous year period. Gross margin for the quarter contracted 249 basis points over the previous year period to 76.86 percent. Total expenses were 85.59 percent of quarterly revenues, up from 83.57 percent for the same period last year. That has resulted in a contraction of 201 basis points in operating margin to 14.41 percent.

Operating income for the quarter was $7.66 million, compared with $7.60 million in the previous year period.

However, the adjusted operating income for the quarter stood at $11.99 million compared to $12.29 million in the prior year period. At the same time, adjusted operating margin contracted 402 basis points in the quarter to 22.57 percent from 26.58 percent in the last year period.

"We started 2017 with a strong first quarter including expanding our market opportunity with additional solutions that we introduced at the RSA Conference in February," said Philippe Courtot, chairman and chief executive officer of Qualys. "We announced new capabilities and services, including expansion of our virtual and cloud scanning capabilities into all major elastic environments and two new solutions, File Integrity Monitoring and Indication of Compromise detection. We are confident in our long-term strategy to become the ubiquitous security and compliance platform providing enterprises, large and small, with two-second visibility across their global IT assets, helping them secure their digital transformation and consolidating multiple on-premise security and compliance solutions, resulting in significant cost savings."

For the second-quarter 2017, Qualys, Inc. projects revenue to be in the range of $54.30 million to $55.10 million. The company forecasts diluted earnings per share to be in the range of $0.15 to $0.17. On an adjusted basis, the company forecasts diluted earnings per share to be in the range of $0.19 to $0.21.

For financial year 2017, Qualys, Inc. projects revenue to be in the range of $225 million to $228 million. The company forecasts diluted earnings per share to be in the range of $1 to $1.06. It forecasts diluted earnings per share to be in the range of $0.81 to $0.86 on adjusted basis.

The company has spent $1.01 million cash to meet investing activities during the quarter as against cash outgo of $1.57 million in the last year period.

The company has spent $8.50 million cash to carry out financing activities during the quarter as against cash inflow of $5.21 million in the last year period.

Cash and cash equivalents stood at $109.65 million as on Mar. 31, 2017, down 2.51 percent or $2.82 million from $112.47 million on Mar. 31, 2016.

Working capital increases

Qualys, Inc. has recorded an increase in the working capital over the last year. It stood at $157.74 million as at Mar. 31, 2017, up 14.22 percent or $19.63 million from $138.11 million on Mar. 31, 2016. Current ratio was at 2.15 as on Mar. 31, 2017, down from 2.18 on Mar. 31, 2016.

Days sales outstanding went down to 71 days for the quarter compared with 83 days for the same period last year.

At the same time, days payable outstanding went down to 25 days for the quarter from 32 for the same period last year.